Monday, July 30, 2012

Anti-smoking ads are as plentiful as butts at a nicotine
convention. And they’re often mocked by the intended target audience for trying
too hard.

But this Thai anti-smoking campaign from Ogilvy has a core
idea that grabs even smokers in the act.

It didn’t take graphs, spooky facts, scare tactics, or even
riffs on classic cigarette ads, as some anti-smoking spots have done. It simply highlighted an age-old tack of
having those addicted warn others not to make the same mistake.

The effect hits hardest when the audience sees the light
bulb go off for the smokers – as these planted kids cause the smokers to simply
warn themselves.

As we see it, this ‘advice to kids’ angle might be an
interesting insight to help highlight a number of things adults do that they’d
warn kids against doing. Bike helmets,
anyone?

So yes, kids say the darndest things. And they also can cause us to question the
darned adults we have become.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Many advertisers don’t appear to be as hot with Olympic fever this year.

For example, the London Evening Standard thought they’d end up with a bunch of cash from media sales, but their eBay-style ad auction proved them wrong. The bidding war (or lack there of) surprised many when expectations came in lower than the score on a pole vaulter using a bendy straw.

As a result, there’s still plenty of room for outdoor advertising around London. So, if you’ve got an extra hundred million (pounds, that is) laying around, put it to good use.

Overall, the the games cost $15 billion, but the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) has only raised $2 billion in sponsorship gold.

For that $13 billion differential, they could buy out the real Olympic birthplace, Greece, post-default….

The LOCOG have also installed some tight rules to ensure non-sponsors don’t get in the games:
• Logos from non-sponsors are being covered up with tape in public places (including the ‘loo!’)
• Athletes are restriced from using Olympic symbols in blogging/social media (#freedom of expression?)
• “Advertising police” can raid any potentially unauthorized advertising areas and fine offenders 20,000 pounds

Like rampant parking meter maids, that’s one way to gain revenue. But whatever happened to love of the game…or Games?

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Considering the public’s limited attention span, Facebook
should be proud of its longevity in Net years. Surveys show, however, that its popularity is
fading -- and not just on Wall Street after the botched IPO:

"The online poll (Reuters/Ipsos) also found that 34 percent
of Facebook users surveyed were spending less time on the website than six
months ago"(Reuters)

So if users are expressing a decrease in satisfaction, why
do they keep using it?

Connection is a key component, of course.

But also, long before the web, we’ve had an innate desire to
broadcast to others about ourselves, from wearing logoed clothes to putting
alma mater labels on den walls or car windows. Social media simply provides us with another
outlet to satisfy this desire.

Plus, Facebook has made it more constant, and convenient.

In fact, comments posted on articles discussing
dissatisfaction with Facebook were posted on none other than...Facebook.

So despite analysts predicting its imminent demise via
dwindling satisfaction, we won’t stop using it unless something else becomes
more appealing, more convenient, or, as they say in college where Facebook
started, more ‘popular.’

But buying Pinterest, auto-face-recognition for tagging, and
having loads of cash would make anyone popular on campus, right?